Buzz Out Loud 714: Dr. M for mayor

Somehow, Dr. M has proven himself so diabolically clever that we kind of love him. In other news, will the next iPhone be unlocked, sell for $199 with AT&T contract, cure malaria, wash your dishes, and defeat Kasparov? It will if you believe the rumors. We like to believe them. It's a happy fantasy world. Also, Wikipedia is broken. Where have you heard that before? Oh, yeah. Here.
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I’m a long time listener and am pretty sure that I am an integral part of the show (even though I have never gotten around to e-mailing, leaving a voice mail, or traveling across the country to score a beer soaked CNET sticker).

I want to make it clear that If drafted, I will not run; if nominated, I will not accept; if elected, I will not serve...as Buzztown mayor. I am too busy trying to figure out how to perfect the pen flip to be bothered with such trifles.

Preserving my internet anonymity,
Snit

P.S. Molly, you are like the sister I never had

FedEx tracking

BOL,
A relative of mine, who happens to be in law enforcement, told me a story once about using FedEx for smuggling. It seems to fit well with your conversation about getting twitter messages about the progress of your shipments in episode 711.

He told me that smugglers (aka drug dealers) will drop off a package at a FedEx office at a particular time every day for several days. Then on the FedEx Web site they watch the progress of each package and get an idea of when a package hits certain points (i.e. Bogota to Miami, Miami to Memphis, Memphis to Detroit, out for delivery) in the delivery chain. Then they send the contraband from the office at the appointed time. If they see a variation in the delivery times the recipient at the other end knows not to accept delivery. A variation means the package was stopped and time was taken to get a warrant to open it or for the recipient's arrest. It usually takes a day to get a warrant.

So thanks to twitter, we have been able to improve the supply chain automation process for all forms of sales and distribution.

See ya,
Mark from Virginia

Airline Mesh Network

Dear Buzzards,
I was in the cockpit over the eastern U.S. the other day and decided to take out my laptop and look up some technical data on the 737 I was flying. At the unnamed American Airline I fly for we have recently begun carrying our manuals in digital format. When I booted up I noticed that wireless networks were available. This is quite common and is usually someone’s laptop in the cabin. Just out of curiosity, however, I opened up the Wi-Fi window and saw that the signal was from an aircraft with Wi-Fi service that was flying just above and ahead of us. I knew it was from that airplane because the signal identified itself as being from a particular U.S. airline, (which will also remain unnamed), that has Wi-Fi service and we heard their call sign on our frequency. That got me thinking about the proposed balloon network you talked about a while back and I was wondering if you couldn’t come up with an airline mesh network. Our airline alone has more than 2,500 flights a day and the sky is always packed with airliners. Have you ever had to sit in the air an extra hour in a holding pattern because there were too many airplanes in a given block of airspace ahead of you? ATC is always having to speed up, slow down and vector traffic to maintain legal separation. If all those airliners were equipped to create a mesh network you could easily defer the cost of the equipment as well as compensate the airlines for the service. It might even help keep travel costs down. Maybe it’s silly but it seems as valid an idea as balloons

Keep up the good work,
Vic the Texas Pilot Rancher

Happy Vista SP1 user

Hey BOL’ers,
Count me as part of (what I believe to be) the silent majority of content Vista users. It just works. Always. Never had a problem with it.
Just yesterday I noticed the SP1 upgrade as an optional update to my Vista PC. I went through the upgrade and had no issues. Today I’m using it--you guessed it--without any issues.

While there may be a few vocal Vista haters, I’m sure there are plenty more of us shiny, happy Vista people roaming the streets using the latest Microsoft OS--wait for it--with no (or few) issues.